Cusco coilovers - repair or replace?
 

Hi guys - I was hoping to draw from the well of your amassed suspension experience.

After years of searching I've just bought my first GC8, a '99 Type R V5 Ltd. It comes with Cusco coilovers fitted and the rear passenger side has a slight knock and could do with a rebuild. It's not a big or urgent job but what would you advise - spending the money on a full refurb for all corners or replacing them with another brand?

I've no experience of Cusco's so any help or advice would be greatly appreciated.

I have Tein suspension on my Bugeye and noticed that one seemed to be leaking oil. Cleaned it up and a couple of months later checked on it and evidence again of leakage. Contacted Tein about getting them rebuilt. OMG!!! it would have cost me over £500 PER STRUT to get them rebuilt. A complete new setup was less than £1000. so definitely worth contacting as to the price of a rebuild as it is much more labour involved than just building a strut.

From what I've gathered over the years HKS coilovers aren't best suited to our UK roads, especially if they are old and no doubt worn which sounds the case.

It wouldn't make sense to get them rebuilt when there are better setups around (financially no doubt also), depending on what you plan on doing with the car? fast road or occasional track use etc

If you rebuilt them you could also get them revalved at the same time. Essentially these all use a piston and shims. You can change the piston to one which offers greater control of fluid flow and then re-shim to suit your desires. Bilstein 46mm pistons work in BC coilovers for example. From this, should you be able to find a set of scrapped RB320 struts you could mimic their damping curve for example, although any good tuners should be able to do a decent job.

When I had HKS hypermax coilovers on my first impreza they were a bit worse for ware.... Sumo power wanted more than the cost of our sun to get them rebuilt. At a loose end I spoke to Nirton who at the time replaced all the seals and revalved them. It was a very long time ago they may not be so willing these days to fix other makes of dampers but a phone call can't do any harm.... worst case they say no they can't help!

Coil over design and valving is a dark art it seems, and the way certain folk import tham can easily give a manufacturer a bad name. Coils meant for JDM streets will be valved differently to a set exported for the UK. By BC's from Ebay and they'll likely be from the far east. Get them from a Dealer and they will have come via APex and valved for UK roads.

That's just the way of it. My personal set are now BC Racing ZR fully adjustables. I run crazy stiff springs, but they feel plush and smooth- because of the valving and damping arrangement. You get what you pay for and these are their top of the range units. No complaints for me.